Coax Type, Direct Burial, Conduit, Grounding

[onyunn]

Trying to figure out new install, never had any sat service.

I have a 6" OD SCH 40 Steel conduit that is 10', cemented with re bar to a depth of 5 feet, located 60 feet from my home. On the conduit I have a steel reducer to a 2" OD Tube, giving me an additional 3 feet of height. I also have a collar around the 6" conduit with a steel brace to an outdoor shed.

I have ditched a 18" deep trench from the pole mount to the corner of my home, through which I assume I will pass the cables through my rim joist, and ultimately into my A/V panel.

Questions:

1. Where are the grounding locations? I would install an outdoor waterproof enclosure on the pole mount, and put inside a 4-way grounding block....run a soild core #10 copper wire from the block to a 4' copper grounding rod into the ground near the base of the pole mount?

Would I also install another waterproof external box where the coax meets the house, and install another 4-way block and ground rod?

Are there any signal degradation problems with the use of the grounding blocks and breaking the line with their use? Do I only need 1 ground either at the pole or near the house?

2. How many runs do I need for a SWM install? 3 HD DVR receivers inside the house. All existing internal wiring is home-run RG-6 QUAD. I was planning on running 4 from the pole to the house. Should I run more than that for anything in the future, or if I plan on installing an outdoor antenna for OTA?

3. I plan on using 1.5" OD SCH 40, or flex ply in the trench between the pole mount and house. Can I get away with using non-direct burial if inside conduit? I can't find RG-6 QUAD Direct Burial with a sweep test to 3 Ghz and solid copper core.


Any advice and or suggested changes would be greatly appreciated.

p.s. The reason for the extreme pole mount is I live in Western NY in a higher wind area.

[RACJ2]

Hopefully one of installers will jump in and answer your questions in depth. The only things I can tell you is with a new deal, the standard installation is free. With all the pre-work you did, hopefully they can provide and run the cabling from the dish to the house for you.

If you get the SWMLNB, you should only need one run of RG6 from the dish to the house. Inside the house, you only need one RG6 cable to each room you are adding a DVR or receiver, provided they do install a SWMLNB. Otherwise you will need dual runs for DVR's.

If you read this attachment, it will explain it better then I can.
19138

[onyunn]

Any installers please let me know your thoughts.

[Teronzhul]

Well, from an ex installer...

1. Per the national electric code you need to ground at the service entrance to the home. You can also ground at the pole, but code requires that such a grounding operation be further grounded every 20 feet with a #6 conductor binding them. This obviously would not be ideal for a situation 60 feet from the house.

Just ground at the cable entrance, preferably to the existing common house ground at your electrical meter. I do find it funny though that you were suggesting a 4 foot ground rod on a pole already 5 feet in the ground :D I'm not sure if the ground where you are permits it, but most all ground rods around here are 8-12' deep.

Any time you run the cable through a connector (ground blocks included) there is some signal loss. Typically this is less than a single db and not really something to worry about, unless you're going through many connections.


2. Technically only one line is needed from the LNB to the dish if you're doing an swm install with 8 tuners or less. This however leaves you with no room to expand at all, and no flexibility regarding alternative dish setups. Since you're going 18" deep and 60' I would definitely run at least 4, and probably 6 cables for future use. 6 gives you 4 for standard lnb, one for ota, and one for who knows what.

I'm waiting to see if we're going to get a BSS dish for the new bands that combines into some new multiswitch. In in any case, this is a situation where a little overkill can't hurt, and judging by your pole setup, it doesn't look like you mind overkill.

3. I figure you'll probably be fine with non direct burial in conduit, especially since you're not directly burying it. I never dealt with harsh freezing temps or anything in the south, but I've seen non-direct burial wire directly buried and functional for 10+ years at many, many houses. I can't imagine you would have any problems at all.

[David MacLeod]

just a thought, if you are running all your own cable and its buried and enclosed, it might be prudent to include a spare run. from experience I know its a pita to dig up a run due to a bad cable, having a swappable one nearby might be useful.

[SledDog]

If you use a SWNLine dish, you will only need one coax running from the dish to your house.

I would pull a spare coax, or at the very least, a pull string in case you need to run anything else in the conduit.

[BattleZone]

2. Technically only one line is needed from the LNB to the dish if you're doing an swm install with 8 tuners or less. This however leaves you with no room to expand at all, and no flexibility regarding alternative dish setups. Since you're going 18" deep and 60' I would definitely run at least 4, and probably 6 cables for future use. 6 gives you 4 for standard lnb, one for ota, and one for who knows what.

A man with some obvious experience. I was also going to recommend 6, even though *if* you get a SWM, only one will be required today.

Also, it's virtually certain that you won't need quad shield, and you won't need flooded cable if you're putting it in conduit (and conduit is what I'd recommend, as it protects better and makes cable replacement possible).

Run a dual with messenger/ground attached (plus additional cables as you wish, again, I'd recommend 6 total) from the dish, through the conduit, to the service entrance. The messenger will be bonded to the dish and to the ground block, and the ground block bonded to the house ground with 10 ga solid copper wire.

[satguy22]

In my experence it will be hard to find an installer to touch it. It isnt that there is anything wrong, just DTV has rules and guide lines that would require your job a failed QC and cost the installer his job or money.

[onyunn]

The reason I'm wanting to do all the legwork and install, is that I'm a complete perfectionist, and this is a 3 year old house. Can I do a self install and activate the receivers with DTV via phone?

[carl6]

The reason I'm wanting to do all the legwork and install, is that I'm a complete perfectionist, and this is a 3 year old house. Can I do a self install and activate the receivers with DTV via phone?

You can do a self install, but you will have to obtain everything from a 3rd party vendor such as solidsignal or valueelectronics. Dish, LNB, DVRs, etc. I don't think you can get any of the DirecTV new customer promotions that way, and your overall initial cost will be higher as you will have to buy the dish, coax, etc.

[netraa]

The reason I'm wanting to do all the legwork and install, is that I'm a complete perfectionist, and this is a 3 year old house. Can I do a self install and activate the receivers with DTV via phone?

Talk to your neighbors, find out if anyone has had a recent install, and if they were happy with the install(er). If they were, and they have the installers phone number call him up and see if he's interested in doing your install for you. Tell him that you will order the system through him (most hsp's have internal sales teams that get you the new customer deals and him a commission) Have him come over and do a site walk with you, evaluate him yourself. If you are happy with him, order the system right then, schedule it out 1 month, and the tech will have his office pull it forward to his number and a day that works for both of you. It would also help to let him know that you will call him for service issues because he stands a very real chance of getting a charge back if the system is as seriously out of spec as you say it might be.

You get a good tech, a good install, and the new customer deals. He gets the sales spiff, the install, and any tip your willing to give since it's most definitely not a standard install.

*this only works in areas where the techs can have jobs pulled forward and reassigned.

[Mertzen]

I do find it funny though that you were suggesting a 4 foot ground rod on a pole already 5 feet in the ground :D

Since the pole is embedded in the concrete it has little to no grounding value.:rolleyes:

[harsh]

Google "ground bonding point". There's lots of information about what constitutes a bonding point and how you might extend one. The other part of grounding that is imperative to understand is that daisy chaining grounds is expressly prohibited by the NEC.

This site is often a good place to start: http://www.mikeholt.com/mojonewsarchive/GB-HTML/HTML/GroundingSatelliteDishandLead-InCables~20020303.htm

[Teronzhul]

Since the pole is embedded in the concrete it has little to no grounding value.:rolleyes:


If the tower is bolted to galvanized pipe that is embedded in concrete of
which a significant amount is in contact with soil, you have a
"concrete-encased grounding electrode" which is hard to improve upon. It is
not likely that a ground rod would be worthwhile, since damp concrete
(concrete in intimate contact with soil at grade level) is a fairly good
conductor, and such a footing or foundation has hundreds of times the
surface area of a ground rod. Just be certain that your station equipment
is solidly bonded to the tower and to the electrical service neutral with a
#6 AWG or larger copper conductor.

Specific guidance for the grounding and bonding of radio and television
antennas, including Amateur Radio systems, is found in Article 810 of NFPA
70, the National Electrical Code.

73, Eric Lemmon WB6FLY


Now this is just a random quote from an online source, but I've been under the impression that moist concrete is just as good an electircial conductor as moist ground. I understand that this quote is referencing the entire foundation of a building, not just a single pole. I'm using it simply as a confirmation that encasing something in concrete doesn't suddenly make it useless as a conductor.

There is quite a bit of information on "concrete-encased grounding electrodes" available online, and it doesn't appear to me that a 4' ground rod would be of much use in this situation.

Feel free to prove me wrong, but do so with more than an emoticon please.

[bsdbytes]

The technical definition of a concrete-encased electrode is described in Section 250-50(c) of the NEC, which reads:

"c) Concrete-Encased Electrode. An electrode encased by at least 2 in. (50.8 mm) of concrete, located within and near the bottom of a concrete foundation or footing that is in direct contact with the earth, consisting of at least 20 ft (6.1 m) of one or more bare or zinc galvanized or other electrically conductive coated steel reinforcing bars or rods of not less than ½-in. (12.7-mm) diameter, or consisting of at least 20 ft (6.1 m) of bare copper conductor not smaller than No. 4. Reinforcing bars shall be permitted to be bonded together by the usual steel tie wires or other effective means.1"

Concrete isn't a good conductor of electricity, he would still need to use a proper ground in this particular situation.

[Teronzhul]

I'm not advocating in any way that he shouldn't ground, and in my first post already suggested grounding per the NEC at the service entrance.

Surface area and bonding to the earth appear more important than the individual conductivity of the grounding element. The ultimate point I was making is that a 4 foot ground rod at the pole would be of dubious value.

Note, the definition in the last post provides 3 possible ways to create such a concrete encased electrode. The first one is "An electrode encased by at least 2 in. (50.8 mm) of concrete, located within and near the bottom of a concrete foundation or footing that is in direct contact with the earth" and I'm pretty sure his pole meets that.

This is a lot of effort for a statement that was just meant to poke fun... sheesh.

[RobertY]

The mast ground can be any length at least 17 awg ccs, a coax ground should be 10 awg sc and under 20 feet.

[harsh]

"Concrete-encased electrode" refers to the rebar that is used to reinforce the concrete and, if I'm not mistaken, it is usually code that it ultimately be tied electrically to the service entrance bonding point.

Even damp, concrete is a very, very poor conductor absent special doping.

[harsh]

The mast ground can be any length at least 17 aug ccs, a coax ground should be 10 aug sc and under 20 feet.Did you mean awg as opposed to aug?

[RobertY]

Right and bonded to an nec approved ground point.